The reason TIM is there is to fill tiny holes so to metal surfaces have as much contact area as possible.

When TIM doesn't go all the way to the edge your actually introducing a "hole" around the TIM.

The IHS is designed to do as is name implies, spread the heat to take up that the area of the spreader. So to not utilise what it is designed for is illogical.

Especially when using coolers like this where you want the heat to be going through as many heat-pipes efficiently as possible. (I.E edge to edge heat absorption)

Whilst it's not going to make a huge difference calling it "good" is a load of rubbish.

Good = Edge to edge even distribution of TIM that is as thin as possible.

Having some difficulty explaining what I mean in words.

But to summarise, a perfect interface between a heatsink and a heat-spreader would be entirely flat. Blob of crap in the middle is not flat.

Click to expand...

You seem to be ruling out the TIM itself. Different types of TIM require different pressure to evenly distribute. The quantity and consistency of TIM makes a difference. Perhaps the consistency of the TIM used in this review would warrant a bit more of it to be used when applied in this manner.

I personally like spreading my time across the IHS in an even thin layer but even so, the end result is very minimal and doing so in a review wouldn't be beneficial to showing how much pressure the heatsink makes when mounted.